Madly
by peacepoetrypotter
Summary: Harry and Ginny are irrevocably in love, Ron feels that Harry has betrayed him, and Hermione's suggestion doesn't work out quite like she hoped. WARNING: profanity, some sexual content, a very angry Ron, an ultimatum, and a major plot twist. Non-DH-compliant.


Harry woke up much earlier than everyone else, and went downstairs to read the previous day's _Daily Prophet_ in closer detail. Only a few minutes after he'd sat down in the kitchen with a cuppa and the paper, he heard footsteps coming down the stairs.

_Who else is up at four in the morning?_

"I thought I'd heard you," said Ginny, and Harry immediately abandoned his tea and the _Prophet_ on the counter as a smile spread across his face.

"I didn't wake you, did I?" Harry whispered worriedly as he approached her.

"I'm not completely awake yet, so no," she whispered back, and their lips touched. Quickly the gentle kiss became more passionate.

Ginny pulled back to whisper to Harry. "Come on up."

"You're the boss," Harry whispered in her ear, and he followed her up the stairs and into her room, closing the door after them. Their hands linked, their eyes met, and Ginny pulled her wand from her bedside table.

"Muffliato," she said, expecting her voice to shake, and was pleasantly surprised to find that it was steady. She and Harry had talked about this, but they never dared to go beyond snogging while they were at school. She cast a couple more protective spells, then set her wand back down and pulled Harry into her with his tee shirt. He grabbed it from her, slipping it over his head in between intense and intoxicating kisses, and before long the only article of clothing left on either of them were Harry's glasses. Ginny collapsed back on her bed, pulling Harry down on top of her, then flipping them both so that she was on top of him.

"Oh, so that's how this works, is it?" he said jokingly, pulling her hair tie out with his left hand as his right hand caressed her right arm.

"Of course it is, silly, you're with me," she replied with a smile, kissing his neck and slowly moving her lips lower and lower, squealing twenty minutes later when he flipped her over and returned the gesture before continuing to kiss her passionately on the lips. She wrapped her arms around him, pressing his chest even closer to hers and pulling him into her.

Around an hour later, both exhausted and exhilarated, they slid back into their clothes and lay in bed as Harry explained to Ginny everything he could about the mission he was setting off on.

"So until you find them all, you won't be able to kill him?" Ginny asked after an extended and in depth description of the Horcrux hunt.

"We think so, yeah," Harry responded, stroking her cheek.

"Do you have any ideas as to the others?"

"Not yet. They're supposedly going to be things that were important to him when he was younger, but it's hard to figure out what those might be."

"Well, I have faith that the three of you will figure it out." Ginny rolled onto her back, looking sideways at Harry as she spoke.

"Thanks for the vote of confidence, Gin. We shouldn't be talking about this anyway."

"Please don't give me some rubbish about my age…"

"That's not what I meant," Harry said, placing his right hand on her left hip and leaning into her for another kiss, which was cut short as the door of Ginny's room swung open.

"Ginny, do you know where I put my -" Ron began to ask, stopping immediately in his tracks after seeing Harry. As Ron teared up, he started to shake his head, unable to speak any longer, and looked at Harry in an expression which meant he didn't need to: shock, betrayal and burning hatred. He turned and raced up the stairs. Harry jumped off Ginny's bed and followed closely behind.

"Ron! Ron, what are you doing? Ron!" Harry yelled. He got an answer quickly; Ron went into the room they shared and grabbed all of the belongings they had decided to take on the Horcrux hunt. His were stuffed into his canvas backpack, and he chucked all of Harry's things out of the window, waking everyone else in the house.

"Ronald! Ronald Bilius Weasley, what are you doing?" his mother screamed, but he ignored her, grabbing his knapsack and stomping back down the stairs and out of the house, Harry running only a few steps behind.

"Ron! We aren't even going to talk about this?"

"What is there to talk about, Harry? You knew how this would end!"

"That's why I didn't tell you, Ron! I don't want-"

"So that's how this works, huh? Everyone prefers you, and you can sit and listen to my secrets and then just go ahead and act as you bloody please, because you're the Boy Who Lived, and no matter what you do, everyone will always prefer you?"

"Ron, this has nothing to do with that!"

"Oh, this has everything to do with that! How could you, Harry? I thought you were my best friend!"

"I **am** your best friend, Ron!"

"No! No, you're not! Best friends don't sleep with their friends' sisters! Especially not behind everyone's backs! My family's taken you in! You've been like a brother to all of us! How could you do something like this?"

Neither of the boys noticed the rest of the family following them outside and crowding by the doorway.

"Ron, will you just listen to me-"

"No, Harry! For once, for one time in your entire life, you're going to listen to me!"

Harry braced himself for the worst, as did Hermione and Ginny watching at the door.

"You lied to me! For years, Harry! For years you've fucking lied to me!" Ron screamed.

"Ronald!" Molly yelled in disapproval, but Ron didn't even turn around until he saw his sister at the door.

"And you!" he cried, pointing at Ginny, "I thought you were better than this! You're better than this!"

"Ron," she pled, but couldn't choke out anything else, and Ron directed his attention back to Harry.

"You can't lie to me this time! There's nothing to cover it up this time! No Quidditch game, nothing! I was so incredibly stupid, Harry, to actually believe you. Every single bloody time. You always had some excuse, but now you don't! As the muggles say, 'the cat's out of the box' or something like that."

"Ron, please! We're in the middle of a war, the three of us are going off together soon, and Bill's getting married in a few days! You can't just leave now," said Hermione as calmly as she could, knowing that she, Bill, and Fleur seemed to be the only people who were keeping their composure to begin with. "Find some way to make up, at least enough for us all to live together."

"Like what?" he asked harshly, though his voice was slightly softer.

_Count on Hermione to bring Ron to his senses,_ thought Ginny, leaning deeper into her.

"I don't know…have conditions or something…you know, you'll stick around and be civil as long as Harry agrees to do something for you."

"Good idea, 'Mione," he complimented her, then stared towards the ground for a few tense minutes.

"You," he finally continued, still pointing his wand at Harry, "have to promise me something."

"Okay..." Harry said weakly.

"Swear - swear to me that you'll never kiss Ginny again."

His words hit Harry like a wall caving in on him. He glanced at Ginny and Hermione out of the corner of his eye, Ginny's head buried in Hermione's neck and Hermione glaring at Ron as she wrapped her arms around Ginny.

"I can't," Harry said.

**"What?"**

Ron gripped his wand tighter, but Hermione had Disarmed him before he was able to do anything. Bill raced in the middle of the two when Ron physically advanced towards Harry instead.

"Ron, be reasonable. He is your best friend, after all," Bill began.

"What kind of best friend-" Ron protested.

"Ron, stop it!" Ginny exclaimed, cutting him off and wriggling free of Hermione. She pushed herself to stand to her full height. "You don't have a say in this!"

"But Ginny-"

"But Ginny fucking **nothing**!" she screamed, eliciting a disapproving shake of her mother's head which she chose to ignore. "I am **not** a little girl! I make my own bloody choices about who I date and who I don't and what I do or do not do with them! You're looking at this like he took advantage of me or something, and it's not like that, not one bit! This is just as much my choice as it is Harry's. I know I'm your sister, and he's your best mate, but all that's just too damn bad because I choose him and he chooses me, and you can't do anything about it, even though I know you'd try. I **know** you'd try to guilt Harry out of it, but that's not the least bit fair to me or to him, and terribly immature at best. You're just going to have to buck up and deal with it, because it's not your fucking choice, and nothing you say is going to change my mind!"

Ron grimaced, and he and Ginny spent a moment glaring at each other, then Ron turned back to Harry. He Disarmed Hermione, grabbing his wand back from her, then pulled his bag back onto his broad shoulder and started sprinting away from the house. Hermione slid out of the doorway and ran after him, yelling "Ron! Ron! Ron, please come back!", but he kept running. He passed through the protective barrier of the Burrow, and they all knew that he was gone. Hermione collapsed onto the ground where she stood, bawling, and Ginny immediately ran to her. Molly, although she herself was on the verge of tears, walked over to Harry to grip him in a motherly hug; she stroked his hair, trying her best to comfort him as he broke down, practically sobbing.

"I've ruined everything now, haven't I?" he eventually choked out.

"Of course not, sweetheart. Ron will come to his senses, I promise you," she said, cupping his cheeks in her cold palms.

"Now let's everyone get inside. We've got a wedding to finish planning!"

She let go of Harry and began to usher everyone else inside. She considered going over to Ginny and Hermione, but then thought the better of it, seeing them still tightly gripping each other. She shook her head and tears came to her eyes. She turned back to the stone-still Harry.

"Do you want a few moments, dear?"

He nodded shakily. She walked back to him, kissed his hair, and continued into the house, leaving the door wide open behind her. Once he thought he was able to walk again, he slowly moved over to Ginny and Hermione, and sat down beside them. Ginny stood up, running her hands one last time through Hermione's hair and quickly laying a gentle grip on Harry's hand. He turned his hand over so that he was holding her hand, brought it up to his lips, and kissed it. She bent down and kissed his cheek before turning to leave, and after letting her hand go, he wrapped his arms around Hermione.

"I'm so sorry, 'Mione. I never meant for..."

"I know," she whispered through her tears, leaning into his shoulder. "It's my fault, anyway. I should have known he'd come up with something like that, something I knew you'd never rightly be able to agree to..."

"How did you know that?"

"It's for the same reason you were in her room in the first place, Harry, same reason as I've assumed you've told her everything by this point..."

"Seriously though, how did you know that?"

"You know how I know that, Harry. We've talked about this. It's in your eyes, just like I've told you before."

"Be- because…at some point in the past six years, and for reasons I can't completely explain, I fell madly in love with Ginny," Harry said.

"Exactly," Hermione replied, speaking at a normal volume due to her confidence in the fact. "Now if only you'd told **her** that..."

"How do you know I haven't?"

"She was scared out of her mind for a few minutes there, Harry. She knows you love her, I know. What she doesn't know is how much. There is a difference between **loving** someone and being **in love** with them, you know."

"But what if that's too soon, Hermione? I mean, we only started-"

"Did you hear her? She chooses you. That's not a light or fleeting conclusion; that's a final decision. You know Ginny; she doesn't decide easily, but once she does there is no way known to man to change her mind. And I know you're worried about not surviving, but wouldn't you regret not telling her? I think you'd have trouble taking your mind off it while we're away, feeling that you should've done it."

"Probably...I just don't...I can't bear the thought of making this even harder for her." He sighed, and she lifted her head off his shoulder to look at him.

"Sometimes that can't be avoided, Harry. Often, the things that are the hardest...are the things that matter most."


End file.
